RUDYARD KIPLING VOLUME XIV THE DAY'S WORK $ Hi PART II THE WRITINGS IN PROSE AND VERSE OF RUDYARD KIPLING THE DATS WORK PART II NEW YORK CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 1899 502058 1%. 11.4 £97 Copyright, 1893, 1894, 1895, 1896, 1897, 1898, 1899, By RUDYARD KIPLING 3: In rearranging my stories for the Outward Bound Edition I was careful to divide them into groups. This necessitated holding over several of the tales which were in design an integral part of " The Day's Work," till that book appeared. They will now be found in their proper places in these volumes. RUDYARD KIPLING. July 14, 1899. CONTENTS PART II PAGE • 007 3 THE WRECK OF THE " VISIGOTH " ... 33 THE MALTESE CAT 41 "BREAD UPON THE WATERS" 75 THE LANG MEN O' LARUT 119 " BRUGGLESMITH " 127 From " Many Inventions." AN ERROR IN THE FOURTH DIMENSION .155 THE RECORD OF BADALIA HERODSFOOT . 185 From " Many Inventions." MY SUNDAY AT HOME 225 THE BRUSHWOOD BOY 249 ILLUSTRATIONS THE RECORD OF BADALIA HERODS- FOOT Frontispiece THE MALTESE CAT 54 THE BRUSHWOOD BOY 250 THE DAY'S WORK PART II .ooy .007 A LOCOMOTIVE is, next to a marine engine, XTL the most sensitive thing man ever made ; and No. .007, besides being sensitive, was new. The red paint was hardly dry on his spotless bumper- bar, his headlight shone like a fireman's helmet, and his cab might have been a hard-wood-finish parlour. They had run him into the round-house after his trial — he had said good-bye to his best friend in the shops, the overhead travelling-crane — the big world was just outside ; and the other locos were taking stock of him. He looked at the semi- circle of bold, unwinking headlights, heard the low purr and mutter of the steam mounting in the gauges — scornful hisses of contempt as a slack valve lifted a little — and would have given a month's oil for' leave to crawl through his own driving-wheels into the brick ash-pit beneath him. .007 was an eight-wheeled "American" loco, slightly different from others of his type, and as he stood he was worth ten thousand dollars on the Company's books. But if you had bought him at his own valuation, after half an hour's waiting in the 3 .007 darkish, echoing round-house, you would have saved exactly nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine dollars and ninety-eight cents. A heavy Mogul freight, with a short cow-catcher and a fire-box that came down within three inches of the rail, began the impolite game, speaking to a Pittsburgh Consolidation, who was visiting. "Where did this thing blow in from?" he asked, with a dreamy puff of light steam. " It's all I can do to keep track of our makes," was the answer, " without lookin' after your back- numbers. 'Guess it's something Peter Cooper left over when he died." .007 quivered ; his steam was getting up, but he held his tongue. Even a hand-car knows what sort of locomotive it was that Peter Cooper experi- mented upon in the far-away Thirties. It carried its coal and water in two apple-barrels, and was not much bigger than a bicycle. Then up and spoke a small, newish switching- engine, with a little step in front of his bumper- timber, and his wheels so close together that he looked like a bronco getting ready to buck. "Something's wrong with the road when a Pennsylvania gravel-pusher tells us anything about our stock, / think. That kid's all right. Eustis designed him, and Eustis designed me. Ain't that good enough ? " .007 could have carried the switching-loco round 4 .ooy the yard in his tender, but he felt grateful for even this little word of consolation. " We don't use hand-cars on the Pennsylvania," said the Consolidation. " That — er — peanut- stand's old enough and ugly enough to speak for himself." " He hasn't bin spoken to yet. He's bin spoke at. Hain't ye any manners on the Penn- sylvania?" said the switching-loco. "You ought to be in the yard, Poney," said the Mogul, severely. " We're all long-haulers here." " That's what you think," the little fellow re- plied. " You'll know more 'fore the night's out. I've bin down to Track 17, and the freight there — oh, Christmas ! " " I've trouble enough in my own division," said a lean, light suburban loco with very shiny brake- shoes. " My commuters wouldn't rest till they got a parlour-car. They've hitched it back of all, and it hauls worse'n a snow-plough. I'll snap her off some day sure, and then they'll blame every one except their fool-selves. They'll be askin' me to haul a vestibuled next ! " " They made you in New Jersey, didn't they *? " said Poney. " Thought so. Commuters and truck-wagons ain't any sweet haulin', but I tell you they're a heap better'n cuttin' out refrig- erator-cars or oil-tanks. Why, I've hauled — " 5 .ooy " Haul ! You ? " said the Mogul, contemptu- ously. " It's all you can do to bunt a cold-storage car up the yard. Now, I — " he paused a little to let the words sink in — "I handle the Flying Freight — e-leven cars worth just anything you please to mention. On the stroke of eleven I pull out; and I'm timed for thirty-five an hour. Costly — perishable — fragile — i mmediate — that's me ! Suburban traffic's only but one degree bet- ter than switching. Express freight's what pays." " Well, I ain't given to blowing, as a rule," began the Pittsburgh Consolidation. "No? You was sent in here because you grunted on the grade," Poney interrupted. " Where I grunt, you'd lie down, Poney : but, as I was saying, I don't blow much. Notwith- standin', z/^you want to see freight that is freight moved lively, you should see me warbling through the Alleghanies with thirty-seven ore-cars behind me, and my brakemen fightin' tramps so 's they can't attend to my tooter. I have to do all the holdin' back then, and, though I say it, I've never had a load get away from me yet. 7V0, sir. Haulin' 's one thing, but judgment and dis- cretion 's another. You want judgment in my business." " Ah ! But — but are you not paralysed by a sense of your overwhelming responsibilities ? " said a curious, husky voice from a corner. 6 .ooy " Who's that ? " .007 whispered to the Jersey commuter. " Compound — experiment — N. G. She's bin switchin' in the B. & A. yards for six months, when she wasn't in the shops. She's economical (I call it mean) in her coal, but she takes it out in re- pairs. Ahem! I presume you found Boston somewhat isolated, madam, after your New York season ? " " I am never so well occupied as when I am alone." The Compound seemed to be talking from half-way up her smoke-stack. "Sure," said the irreverent Poney, under his breath. " They don't hanker after her any in the yard." "But, with my constitution and temperament — my work lies in Boston — I find your outre- Guidance — " " Outer which ? " said the Mogul freight. " Sim- ple cylinders are good enough for me." "Perhaps I should have said faroucberie," hissed the Compound. " I don't hold with any make of papier-mache wheel," the Mogul insisted. The Compound sighed pityingly, and said no more. " Git 'em all shapes in this world, don't ye ? " said Poney. " That's Mass'chusetts all over. They half start, an' then they stick on a dead-centre, an* 7 .ooy blame it all on other folks' ways o' treatin' them. Talkin' o' Boston, Comanche told me, last night, he had a hot-box just beyond the Newtons, Friday. That was why, he says, the Accommodation was held up. Made out no end of a tale, Comanche did." " If I'd heard that in the shops, with my boiler out for repairs, I'd know 'twas one o' Comanche's lies," the New Jersey commuter snapped. " Hot- box ! Him ! What happened was they'd put an extra car on, and he just lay down on the grade and squealed. They had to send 127 to help him through. Made it out a hot-box, did he*? Time before that he said he was ditched ! Looked me square in the headlight and told me that as cool as — as a water-tank in a cold wave. Hot- box! You ask 127 about Comanche's hot-box. Why, Comanche he was side-tracked, and 127 (he was just about as mad as they make 'em on ac- count o' being called out at ten o'clock at night) took hold and snapped her into Boston in seven- teen minutes. Hot-box! Hot fraud! That's what Comanche is." Then .007 put both drivers and his pilot into it, as the saying is, for he asked what sort of thing a hot-box might be ? " Paint my bell sky-blue ! " said Poney, the switcher. " Make me a surface-railroad loco with a hard-wood skirtin'-board round my wheels. 8 .ooy Break me up and cast me into five-cent sidewalk- fakirs' mechanical toys! Here's an eight-wheel coupled ' American ' don't know what a hot-box is ! Never heard of an emergency-stop either, did ye *? Don't know what ye carry jack-screws for ? You're too innocent to be left alone with your own tender. Oh, you — you flat-car ! " There was a roar of escaping steam before any one could answer, and .007 nearly blistered his paint off with pure mortification. " A hot-box," began the Compound, picking and choosing her words as though they were coal, " a hot-box is the penalty exacted from inexperience by haste. Ahem ! " " Hot-box ! " said the Jersey Suburban. " It's the price you pay for going on the tear. It's years since I've had one. It's a disease that don't attack short-haulers, as a rule." "We never have hot-boxes on the Pennsyl- vania," said the Consolidation. " They get 'em in New York — same as nervous prostration." " Ah, go home on a ferry-boat," said the Mogul. " You think because you use worse grades than our road Ju'd allow, you're a kind of Alleghany angel. Now, I'll tell you what you . . . Here's my folk. Well, I can't stop. See you later, perhaps." He rolled forward majestically to the turn-table, and swung like a man-of-war in a tideway, till he 9 .007 picked up his track. " But as for you, you pea- green swivellin' coffee-pot (this to .007), you go out and learn something before you associate with those who've made more mileage in a week than you'll roll up in a year. Costly — perishable — fragile — immediate — that's me ! S' long." " Split my tubes if that's actin' polite to a new member o' the Brotherhood," said Poney. "There wasn't any call to trample on ye like that. But manners was left out when Moguls was made. Keep up your fire, kid, an' burn your own smoke. 'Guess we'll all be wanted in a minute." Men were talking rather excitedly in the round- house. One man, in a dingy jersey, said that he hadn't any locomotives to waste on the yard. An- other man, with a piece of crumpled paper in his hand, said that the yard-master said that he was to say that if the other man said anything, he (the other man) was to shut his head. Then the other man waved his arms, and wanted to know if he was expected to keep locomotives in his hip- pocket. Then a man in a black Prince Albert, without a collar, came up dripping, for it was a hot August night, and said that what he said went; and between the three of them the locomotives began to go, too — first the Compound; then the Consolidation; then .007. Now, deep down in his fire-box, .007 had cher- ished a hope that as soon as his trial was done, he 10 .007 would be led forth with songs and shoutings, and attached to a green-and-chocolate vestibuied flier, under charge of a bold and noble engineer, who would pat him on his back, and weep over him, and call him his Arab steed. (The boys in the shops where he was built used to read wonderful stories of railroad life, and .007 expected things to happen as he had heard.) But there did not seem to be many vestibuied fliers in the roaring, rum- bling, electric-lighted yards, and his engineer only said : " Now, what sort of a fool-sort of an injector has Eustis loaded on to this rig this time *? " And he put the lever over with an angry snap, crying : "Am I supposed to switch with this thing, hey?" The collarless man mopped his head, and re- plied that, in the present state of the yard and freight and a few other things, the engineer would switch and keep on switching till the cows came home. .007 pushed out gingerly, his heart in his headlight, so nervous that the clang of his own bell almost made him jump the track. Lanterns waved, or danced up and down, before and behind him; and on every side, six tracks deep, sliding backward and forward, with clashings of couplers and squeals of hand-brakes, were cars — more cars than .007 had dreamed of. There were oil-cars, and hay-cars, and stock-cars full of lowing beasts, and ore-cars, and potato-cars with stovepipe-ends 11 .ooy sticking out in the middle; cold-storage and re- frigerator cars dripping ice-water on the tracks; ventilated fruit- and milk-cars; flat-cars with truck- wagons full of market-stuff; flat-cars loaded with reapers and binders, all red and green and gilt under the sizzling electric lights; flat-cars piled high with strong-scented hides, pleasant hemlock- plank, or bundles of shingles ; flat-cars creaking to the weight of thirty-ton castings, angle-irons, and rivet-boxes for some new bridge; and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of box-cars loaded, locked, and chalked. Men — hot and angry — crawled among and between and under the thou- sand wheels; men took flying jumps through his cab, when he halted for a moment; men sat on his pilot as he went forward, and on his tender as he returned ; and regiments of men ran along the tops of the box-cars beside him, screwing down brakes, waving their arms, and crying curious things. He was pushed forward a foot at a time; whirled backward, his rear drivers clinking and clanking, a quarter of a mile ; jerked into a switch (yard-switches are very stubby and unaccommo- dating), bunted into a Red D, or Merchant's Trans- port car, and, with no hint or knowledge of the weight behind him, started up anew. When his load was fairly on the move, three or four cars would be cut off, and .007 would bound forward, 12 .ooy only to be held hiccupping on the brake. Then he would wait a few minutes, watching the whirled lanterns, deafened with the clang of the bells, giddy with the vision of the sliding cars, his brake- pump panting forty to the minute, his front coup- ler lying sideways on his cow-catcher, like a tired dog's tongue in his mouth, and the whole of him covered with half-burnt coal-dust. " 'Tisn't so easy switching with a straight-backed tender," said his little friend of the round-house, bustling by at a trot. " But you're comin' on pretty fair. 'Ever seen a flyin' switch? No? Then watch me." Poney was in charge of a dozen heady flat-cars. Suddenly he shot away from them with a sharp "Whutt!" A switch opened in the shadows ahead ; he turned up it like a rabbit as it snapped behind him, and the long line of twelve-foot-high lumber jolted on into the arms of a full-sized road- loco, who acknowledged receipt with a dry howl. "My man's reckoned the smartest in the yard at that trick," he said, returning. " 'Gives me cold shivers when another fool tries it, though. That's where my short wheel-base comes in. Like as not you'd have your tender scraped off if you tried it." .007 had no ambitions that way, and said so. " No ? Of course this ain't your regular busi- ness, but say, don't you think it's interestin"? 13 .007 Have you seen the yard-master *? Well, he's the greatest man on earth, an' don't you forget it. When are we through *? Why, kid, it's always like this, day an' night — Sundays an' week-days. See that thirty-car freight slidin' in four, no, five tracks off4? She's all mixed freight, sent here to be sorted out into straight trains. That's why we're cuttin' out the cars one by one." He gave a vigorous push to a west-bound car as he spoke, and started back with a little snort of surprise, for the car was an old friend — an M. T. K. box-car. " Jack my drivers, but it's Homeless Kate ! Why, Kate, ain't there no gettin' you back to your friends ? There's forty chasers out for you from your road, if there's one. Who's holdin' you now ? " " Wish I knew," whimpered Homeless Kate. " I belong in Topeka, but I've bin to Cedar Rap- ids ; I've bin to Winnipeg ; I've bin to Newport News; I've bin all down the old Atlanta and West Point ; an' I've bin to Buffalo. Maybe I'll fetch up at Haverstraw. I've only bin out ten months, but I'm homesick — I'm just achin' homesick." " Try Chicago, Katie," said the switching-loco ; and the battered old car lumbered down the track, jolting : " I want to be in Kansas when the sun- flowers bloom." .ooy " 'Yard's full o' Homeless Kates an' Wanderin' Willies," he explained to .007. " I knew an old Fitchburg flat-car out seventeen months ; an' one of ours was gone fifteen 'fore ever we got track of her. Dunno quite how our men fix it. 'Swap around, I guess. Anyway, I've done my duty. She's on her way to Kansas, via Chicago ; but I'll lay my next boilerful she'll be held there to wait consignee's convenience, and sent back to us with wheat in the fall." Just then the Pittsburgh Consolidation passed, at the head of a dozen cars. " I'm goin' home," he said proudly. "'Can't get all them twelve on to the flat. Break 'em in half, Dutchy ! " cried Poney. But it was .007 who was backed down to the last six cars, and he nearly blew up with surprise when he found himself pushing them on to a huge ferry- boat. He had never seen deep water before, and shivered as the flat drew away and left his bogies within six inches of the black, shiny tide. After this he was hurried to the freight-house, where he saw the yard-master, a smallish, white- faced man in shirt, trousers, and slippers, looking down upon a sea of trucks, a mob of bawling truckmen, and squadrons of backing, turning, sweating, spark-striking horses. " That's shippers' carts loadin' on to the re- ceivin' trucks," said the small engine, reverently. 15 .ooy " But he don't care. He lets 'em cuss. He's the Czar — King — Boss! He says 'Please,' and then they kneel down an' pray. There's three or four strings o' to-day's freight to be pulled before he can attend to them. When he waves his hand that way, things happen." A string of loaded cars slid out down the track, and a string of empties took their place. Bales, crates, boxes, jars, carboys, frails, cases, and pack- ages flew into them from the freight-house as though the cars had been magnets and they iron filings. "Ki-yah!" shrieked little Poney. "Ain't it great?" A purple-faced truckman shouldered his way to the yard-master, and shook his fist under his nose. The yard-master never looked up from his bundle of freight-receipts. He crooked his forefinger slightly, and a tall young man in a red shirt, loung- ing carelessly beside him, hit the truckman under the left ear, so that he dropped, quivering and clucking, on a hay-bale. "Eleven, seven, ninety-seven, L. Y. S.; four- teen ought ought three; nineteen thirteen; one one four ; seventeen ought twenty-one M. B. ; and the ten west-bound. All straight except the two last. Cut Jem off at the junction. An' thafs all right. Pull that string." The yard-master, with mild blue eyes, looked out over the howling truck- 16 .ooy men at the waters in the moonlight beyond, and hummed : " All things bright and beautiful, All creatures great and small, All things wise and wonderful, The Lawd Gawd He made all ! " .007 moved out the cars and delivered them to the regular road-engine. He had never felt quite so limp in his life before. " Curious, ain't it *? " said Poney, puffing, on the next track. " You an* me, if we got that man under our bumpers, we'd work him into red waste an' not know what we'd done ; but — up there — with the steam hummin' in his boiler that awful quiet way . . ." " / know," said .007. " Makes me feel as if I'd dropped my fire an' was getting cold. He is the greatest man on earth." They were at the far north end of the yard now, under a switch-tower, looking down on the four- track way of the main traffic. The Boston Com- pound was to haul .oo7's string to some far-away northern junction over an indifferent road-bed, and she mourned aloud for the ninety-six-pound rails oftheB.& A. "You're young; you're young," she coughed. " You don't realise your responsibilities." " Yes, he does," said Poney, sharply ; " but he don't lie down under 'em." Then, with a side- .ooy spurt of steam, exactly like a tough spitting: " There ain't more than fifteen thousand dol- lars' worth oj freight behind her anyway, and she goes on as if 'twere a hundred thousand — same as the Mogul's. Excuse me, madam, but you've the track. . . . She's stuck on a dead-centre again — bein' specially designed not to." The Compound crawled across the tracks on a long slant, groaning horribly at each switch, and moving like a cow in a snow-drift. There was a little pause along the yard after her tail-lights had disappeared; switches locked crisply, and every one seemed to be waiting. "Now I'll show you something worth," said Poney. "When the Purple Emperor ain't on time, it's about time to amend the Constitution. The first stroke of twelve is — " " Boom ! " went the clock in the big yard-tower, and far away .007 heard a full, vibrating " Tab! Tab! Tab!" A headlight twinkled on the hori- zon like a star, grew an overpowering blaze, and whooped up the humming track to the roaring music of a happy giant's song: " With a michnai — ghignai — shtingal ! Yah ! Yah ! Yah ! Ein — zwei — drei — Mutter ! Yah ! Yah ! Yah ! She climb upon der shteeple, Und she frighten all der people. Singin* michnai — ghignai — shtingal ! Yah ! Yah ! " 18 .oo7 The last defiant "'yah! yah!" was delivered a mile and a half beyond the passenger-depot ; but .007 had caught one glimpse of the superb six- wheeled-coupled racing-locomotive, who hauled the pride and glory of the road — the gilt-edged Purple Emperor, the millionaires' south-bound express, laying the miles over his shoulder as a man peels a shaving from a soft board. The rest was a blur of maroon enamel, a bar of white light from the electrics in the cars, and a flicker of nickel-plated hand-rail on the rear platform. " Ooh ! " said .007. " Seventy-five miles an hour these five miles. Baths, I've heard; barber's shop; ticker; and a library and the rest to match. Yes, sir; seventy- five an hour ! But he'll talk to you in the round- house just as democratic as I would. And I — cuss my wheel-base ! — I'd kick clean off the track at half his gait. He's the Master of our Lodge. Cleans up at our house. I'll introdooce you some day. He's worth knowin' ! There ain't many can sing that song, either." .007 was too full of emotions to answer. He did not hear a raging of telephone-bells in the switch-tower, nor the man, as he leaned out and called to .oo7's engineer : " 'Got any steam ? " " 'Nough to run her a hundred mile out o' this, if I could," said the engineer, who belonged to the open road and hated switching. .ooy " Then get. The Flying Freight's ditched forty mile out, with fifty rod o' track ploughed up. No; no one's hurt, but both tracks are blocked. Lucky the wreckin'-car an' derrick are this end of the yard. Crew'll be along in a minute. Hurry! You've the track." " Well, I could jest kick my little sawed-off self," said Poney, as .007 was backed, with a bang, on to a grim and grimy car like a caboose, but full of tools — a flat-car and a derrick behind it. "Some folks are one thing, and some are another; but you're in luck, kid. They push a wrecking-car. Now, don't get rattled. Your wheel-base will keep you on the track, and there ain't any curves worth mentionin'. Oh, say ! Comanche told me there's one section o' saw-edged track that's liable to jounce ye a little. Fifteen an' a half out, after the grade at Jackson's crossin'. You'll know it by a farm-house an' a windmill an' five maples in the dooryard. 'Windmill's west o' the maples. An' there's an eighty-foot iron bridge in the mid- dle o' that section with no guard-rails. See you later. Luck ! " Before he knew well what had happened, .007 was flying up the track into the dumb, dark world. Then fears of the night beset him. He remem- bered all he had ever heard of landslides, rain-piled boulders, blown trees, and strayed cattle, all that the Boston Compound had ever said of responsi- 20 .ooy bility, and a great deal more that came out of his own head. With a very quavering voice he whistled for his first grade-crossing (an event in the life of a locomotive), and his nerves were in no way restored by the sight of a frantic horse and a white-faced man in a buggy less than a yard from his right shoulder. Then he was sure he would jump the track ; felt his flanges mounting the rail at every curve ; knew that his first grade would make him lie down even as Comanche had done at the Newtons. He whirled down the grade to Jackson's crossing, saw the windmill west of the maples, felt the badly laid rails spring under him, and sweated big drops all over his boiler. At each jarring bump he believed an axle had smashed, and he took the eighty-foot bridge without the guard-rail like a hunted cat on the top of a fence. Then a wet leaf stuck against the glass of his headlight and threw a flying shadow on the track, so that he thought it was some little dancing animal that would feel soft if he ran over it; and anything soft underfoot frightens a locomotive as it does an elephant. But the men behind seemed quite calm. The wreck- ing-crew were climbing carelessly from the ca- boose to the tender — even jesting with the en- gineer, for he heard a shuffling of feet among the coal, and the snatch of a song, something like this : 21 .ooy " Oh, the Empire State must learn to wait, And the Cannon-ball go hang ! When the West-bound's ditched, and the tool-car's hitched, And it's 'way for the Breakdown Gang (Tara-ra !) 'Way for the Breakdown Gang ! " " Say ! Eustis knew what he was doin' when he designed this rig. She's a hummer. New, too." " Snff ! Phew ! She is new. That ain't paint. That's — " A burning pain shot through .ooy's right rear driver — a crippling, stinging pain. "This," said .007, as he flew, "is a hot-box. Now I know what it means. I shall go to pieces, I guess. My first road-run, too ! " " Het a bit, ain't she *? " the fireman ventured to suggest to the engineer. " She'll hold for all we want of her. We're 'most there. 'Guess you chaps back had better climb into your car," said the engineer, his hand on the brake-lever. " I've seen men snapped off — " But the crew fled back with laughter. They had no wish to be jerked on to the track. The engineer half turned his wrist, and .007 found his drivers pinned firm. " Now it's come ! " said .007, as he yelled aloud, and slid like a sleigh. For the moment he fancied that he would jerk bodily from offhis underpinning. " That must be the emergency-stop that Poney guyed me about," he gasped, as soon as he could 22 .ooy think. " Hot-box — emergency-stop. They both hurt ; but now I can talk back in the round-house." He was halted, all hissing hot, a few feet in the rear of what doctors would call a compound-com- minuted car. His engineer was kneeling down among his drivers, but he did not call .007 his " Arab steed," nor cry over him, as the engineers did in the newspapers. He just bad-worded .007, and pulled yards of charred cotton-waste from about the axles, and hoped he might some day catch the idiot who had packed it. Nobody else attended to him, for Evans, the Mogul's engineer, a little cut about the head, but very angry, was ex- hibiting, by lantern-light, the mangled corpse of a slim blue pig. "'Tweren't even a decent-sized hog," he said. " Twere a shote." " Dangerousest beasts they are," said one of the crew. " Get under the pilot an' sort o' twiddle ye off the track, don't they *? " " Don't they *? " roared Evans, who was a red- headed Welshman. " You talk as if I was ditched by a hog every fool-day o' the week. / ain't friends with all the cussed half-fed shotes in the State o' New York. No, indeed ! Yes, this is him — an' look what he's done ! " It was not a bad night's work for one stray pig- let. The Flying Freight seemed to have flown in every direction, for the Mogul had mounted the 23 .007 rails and run diagonally a few hundred feet from right to left, taking with him such cars as cared to follow. Some did not. They broke their couplers and lay down, while rear cars frolicked over them. In that game, they had ploughed up and removed and twisted a good deal of the left-hand track. The Mogul himself had waddled into a corn-field, and there he knelt — fantastic wreaths of green twisted round his crank-pins; his pilot covered with solid clods of field, on which corn nodded drunkenly ; his fire put out with dirt (Evans had done that as soon as he recovered his senses); and his broken headlight half full of half-burnt moths. His tender had thrown coal all over him, and he looked like a disreputable buffalo who had tried to wallow in a general store. For there lay scattered over the landscape, from the burst cars, type-writers, sewing-machines, bicycles in crates, a consignment of silver-plated imported harness, French dresses and gloves, a dozen finely moulded hard-wood mantels, a fifteen-foot naphtha-launch, with a solid brass bedstead crumpled around her bows, a case of telescopes and microscopes, two coffins, a case of very best candies, some gilt-edged dairy produce, butter and eggs in an omelette, a broken box of expensive toys, and a few hundred other luxuries. A camp of tramps hurried up from nowhere, and generously volunteered to help the crew. So the brakemen, armed with coupler-pins, walked up and 24 .ooy down on one side, and the freight-conductor and the fireman patrolled the other with their hands in their hip-pockets. A long-bearded man came out of a house beyond the corn-field, and told Evans that if the accident had happened a little later in the year, all his corn would have been burned, and accused Evans of carelessness. Then he ran away, for Evans was at his heels shrieking : " 'Twas his hog done it — his hog done it ! Let me kill him ! Let me kill him!" Then the wrecking-crew laughed ; and the farmer put his head out of a window and said that Evans was no gentleman. But .007 was very sober. He had never seen a wreck before, and it frightened him. The crew still laughed, but they worked at the same time ; and .007 forgot horror in amazement at the way they handled the Mogul freight. They dug round him with spades ; they put ties in front of his wheels, and jack-screws under him; they embraced him with the derrick-chain and tickled him with crow- bars ; while .007 was hitched on to wrecked cars and backed away till the knot broke or the cars rolled clear of the track. By dawn thirty or forty men were at work, replacing and ramming down the ties, gauging the rails and spiking them. By daylight all cars who could move had gone on in charge of another loco ; the track was freed for traffic ; and .007 had hauled the old Mogul over a small pavement of ties, inch by inch, till his 25 .ooy flanges bit the rail once more, and he settled down with a clank. But his spirit was broken, and his nerve was gone. " 'Tweren't even a hog," he repeated dolefully ; " 'twere a shote ; and you —you of all of 'em — had to help me on." " But how in the whole long road did it hap- pen ? " asked .007, sizzling with curiosity. " Happen ! It didn't happen ! It just come ! I sailed right on top of him around that last curve — thought he was a skunk. Yes ; he was all as little as that. He hadn't more'n squealed once 'fore I felt my bogies lift (he'd rolled right under the pilot), and I couldn't catch the track again to save me. Swivelled clean off, I was. Then I felt him sling himself along, all greasy, under my left leadin' driver, and, oh, Boilers ! that mounted the rail. I heard my flanges zippin' along the ties, an' the next I knew I was - playin' ' Sally, Sally Waters' in the corn, my tender shuckin' coal through my cab, an' old man Evans lyin' still an' bleedin' in front o' me. Shook ? There ain't a stay or a bolt or a rivet in me that ain't sprung to glory somewhere." " Umm ! " said .007. " What d' you reckon you weigh ? " " Without these lumps o' dirt I'm all of a hun- dred thousand pound." "And the shote?" 26 .ooy "Eighty. Call him a hundred pound at the outside. He's worth about four 'n' a half dollars. Ain't it awful ? Ain't it enough to give you ner- vous prostration? Ain't it paralysing Why, I come just around that curve — " and the Mogul told the tale again, for he was very badly shaken. "Well, it's all in the day's run, I guess," said .007, soothingly; "an' — an' a corn-field's pretty soft fallin'." " If it had bin a sixty-foot bridge, an' I could ha' slid off into deep water an' blown up an' killed both men, same as others have done, I wouldn't ha' cared ; but to be ditched by a shote — an' you to help me out — in a corn-field — an' an old hay- seed in his nightgown cussin' me like as if I was a sick truck-horse ! . . . Oh, it's awful ! Don't call me Mogul ! I'm a sewin'-machine. They'll guy my sand-box off in the yard." And .007, his hot-box cooled and his experience vastly enlarged, hauled the Mogul freight slowly to the round-house. "Hello, old man! Bin out all night, hain't ye ? " said the irrepressible Poney, who had just come off duty. "Well, I must say you look it. Costly — perishable — fragile — immediate — that's you ! Go to the shops, take them vine-leaves out o' your hair, an' git 'em to play the hose on you." " Leave him alone, Poney," said .007, severely, as he was swung on the turn-table, " or I'll — " 27 .ooy " 'Didn't know the old granger was any special friend o' yours, kid. He wasn't over-civil to you last time I saw him." " I know it ; but I've seen a wreck since then, and it has about scared the paint off me. I'm not going to guy any one as long as I steam — not when they're new to the business an' anxious to learn. And I'm not goin' to guy the old Mo- gul either, though I did find him wreathed around with roastin'-ears. 'Twas a little bit of a shote — not a hog — just a shote, Poney — no big- ger'n a lump of anthracite — I saw it — that made all the mess. Anybody can be ditched, I guess." " 'Found that out already, have you *? Well, that's a good beginnin'." It was the Purple Em- peror, with his high, tight, plate-glass cab and green-velvet cushion, waiting to be cleaned for his next day's fly. " Let me make you two gen'lemen acquainted," said Poney. " This is our Purple Emperor, kid, whom you were admirin' and, I may say, en- vyin' last night. This is a new brother, wor- shipful sir, with most of his mileage ahead of him, but, so far as a serving-brother can, I'll an- swer for him." " 'Happy to meet you," said the Purple Em- peror, with a glance round the crowded round- house. " I guess there are enough of us here to 28 .ooy form a full meetin'. Ahem ! By virtue of the authority vested in me as Head of the Road, I hereby declare and pronounce No. .007 a full and accepted Brother of the Amalgamated Brother- hood of Locomotives, and as such entitled to all shop, switch, track, tank, and round-house privi- leges throughout my jurisdiction, in the Degree of Superior Flier, it bein' well known and credibly reported to me that our Brother has covered forty- one miles in thirty-nine minutes and a half on an errand of mercy to the afflicted. At a convenient time, I myself will communicate to you the Song and Signal of this Degree whereby you may be recognised in the darkest night. Take your stall, newly entered Brother among Locomo- tives ! " •3f * * •* # *• -3ft-5f * * Now, in the darkest night, even as the Purple Emperor said, if you will stand on the bridge across the freight-yard, looking down upon the four-track way, at 2 : 30 A. M., neither before nor after, when the White Moth, that takes the over- flow from the Purple Emperor, tears south with her seven vestibuled cream-white cars, you will hear, as the yard-clock makes the half-hour, a far- away sound like the bass of a violoncello, and then, a hundred feet to each word: " With a michnai — ghignai — shtingal! Yah! Yah! Yah! Bin — zwei — drei — Mutter! Yah! Yah! Yah! 29 .ooy She climb upon der shteeple, Und she frighten all der people, Singin' michnai — ghignai — shtingal! Yah! Yah!" That is .007 covering his one hundred and fifty- six miles in two hundred and twenty-one minutes. THE WRECK OF THE "VISIGOTH" THE WRECK OF THE "VISIGOTH"1 "Eternal Father, strong to save, Whose arm hath bound the restless wave, Who bidst the mighty ocean keep Its own appointed limits deep." THE lady passengers were trying the wheezy old harmonium in front of the cuddy, because it was Sunday night. In the patch of darkness near the wheel-grating sat the Captain, and the end of his cheroot burned like a head-lamp. There was neither breath nor motion upon the waters through which the screw was thudding. They spread, dull silver, under the haze of the moonlight till they joined the low coast of Malacca away to the eastward. The voices of the singers at the harmo- nium were held down by the awnings, and came to us with force. " Oh, hear us when we cry to Thee, For those in peril on the sea! " It was as though the little congregation were afraid of the vastness of the sea. But a laugh followed, and some one said, " Shall we take it i Copyright, 1895, by Macmillan & Co. 33 THE WRECK OF THE "VISIGOTH" through again a little quicker ? " Then the Cap- tain told the story of just such a night, lowering his voice for fear of disturbing the music and the minds of the passengers. "She was the Visigoth, — five hundred tons, or it may have been six, — in the coasting trade ; one of the best steamers and best found on the Kutch- Kasauli line. She wasn't six years old when the thing happened : on just such a night as this, with an oily-smooth sea, under brilliant starlight, about a hundred miles from land. To this day no one knows really what the matter was. She was so small that she could not have struck even a log in the water without every soul on board feeling the jar ; and even if she had struck something, it wouldn't have made her go down as she did. I was fourth officer then; we had about seven sa- loon passengers, including the Captain's wife and another woman, and perhaps five hundred deck- passengers going up the coast to a shrine, on just such a night as this, when she was ripping through the level sea at a level nine knots an hour. The man on the bridge, whoever it was, saw that she was sinking at the head. Sinking by the head as she went along. That was the only warning we got. She began to sink as she went along. Of course the Captain was told, and he sent me to wake up the saloon passengers and tell them to come on deck. 'Sounds a curious sort of message 34 THE WRECK OF THE "VISIGOTH" that to deliver on a dead-still night. The people tumbled up in their dressing-gowns and pyjamas, and wouldn't believe me. We were just sinking as fast as we could, and I had to tell 'em that. Then the deck-passengers got wind of it, and all Hell woke up along the decks. " The rule in these little affairs is to get your sa- loon passengers off first, then to fill the boats with the balance, and afterwards — God help the extras, that's all. I was getting the starboard stern boat — the mail-boat — away. It hung as it might be over yonder, and as I came along from the cuddy, the deck-passengers hung round me, shoving their money-belts into my hand, taking off their nose- rings and ear-rings, and thrusting 'em upon me to buy just one chance for life. If I hadn't been so desperately busy, I should have thought it horrible. I put biscuits and water into the boat, and got the two ladies in. One of 'em was the Captain's wife. She had to be put in by main force. You've no notion how women can struggle. The other woman was the wife of an officer going to meet her hus- band ; and there were a couple of passengers beside the lascars. The Captain said he was going to stay with the ship. You see the rule in these affairs, I believe, is that the Captain has to bow gracefully from the bridge and go down. I haven't had a ship under my charge wrecked yet. When that comes, I'll have to do like the others. After 35 THE WRECK OF THE "VISIGOTH" the boats were away, and I saw that there was nothing to be got by waiting, I jumped overboard exactly as I might have vaulted over into a flat green field, and struck out for the mail-boat. Another officer did the same thing, but he went for a boat full of natives, and they whacked him on the chest with oars, so he had some difficulty in climbing in. " It was as well that I reached the mail-boat. There was a compass in it, but the idiots had man- aged to fill the boat half full of water somehow or another, and none of the crew seemed to know what was required of them. Then the Fisigoth went down and took every one with her — ships generally do that ; the corpses don't cumber the sea for some time. " What did I do l? I kept all the boats together, and headed into the track of the coasting steamers. The aggravating thing was the thought that we were close to land as far as a big steamer was concerned, and in the middle of eternity as far as regarded a little boat. The sea looks hugeous big from a boat at night." " Oh, Christ, whose voice the waters heard And hushed their ravings at Thy word, Who walkedst on the foaming deep And calm amidst its rage did keep, — Oh, hear us when we cry to Thee, For those in peril on the sea! " sang the passengers cheerily. " That harmonium is disgracefully out of tune," 36 THE WRECK OF THE "VISIGOTH" said the Captain. " The sea air affects their insides. \Vell, as I was saying, we settled down in the boat. The Captain's wife was unconscious; she lay in the bottom of the boat and moaned. I was glad she wasn't threshing about the boat : but what I did think was wrong, was the way the two men passengers behaved. They were useless with funk — out-and-out fear. They lay in the boat and did nothing. Fetched a groan now and again to show they were alive; but that was all. But the other woman was a jewel. Damn it, it was worth being shipwrecked to have that woman in the boat; she was awfully handsome, and as brave as she was lovely. She helped me bail out the boat, and she worked like a man. " So we kicked about the sea from midnight till seven the next evening, and then we saw a steamer. 'I'll — I'll give you anything I'm wearing to hoist as a signal of distress,' said the woman; but I had no need to ask her, for the steamer picked us up and took us back to Bombay. I forgot to tell you that, when the day broke, I couldn't recognise the Captain's wife — widow, I mean. She had changed in the night as if fire had gone over her. I met her a long time afterwards, and even then she hadn't forgiven me for putting her into the boat and obeying the Captain's orders. But the husband of the other woman — he's in the Army — wrote me no end of a letter of thanks. I don't suppose he considered that the way his wife behaved was 37 THE WRECK OF THE "VISIGOTH" enough to make any decent man do all he could. The other fellows, who lay in the bottom of the boat and groaned, I've never met. 'Don't want to. 'Shouldn't be civil to 'em if I did. And that's how the Visigoth went down, for no assignable reason, with eighty bags of mail, five hundred souls, and not a single packet insured, on just such a night as this." " Oh, Trinity of love and power, Our brethren shield in that dread hour, From rock and tempest, fire and foe, Protect them wheresoe'er they go. Thus evermore shall rise to Thee Glad hymns of praise by land and sea." "'Strikes me they'll go on singing that hymn all night. 'Imperfect sort of doctrine in the last lines, don't you think? They might have run in an extra verse specifying sudden collapse — like the Visigoths. I'm going on to the bridge, now. Good night," said the Captain. And I was left alone with the steady thud, thud, of the screw and the gentle creaking of the boats at the davits. 'that made me shudder. THE MALTESE CAT THE MALTESE CAT THEY had good reason to be proud, and better reason to be afraid, all twelve of them ; for though they had fought their way, game by game, up the teams entered for the polo tournament, they were meeting the Archangels that afternoon in the final match; and the Archangels men were playing with half a dozen ponies apiece. As the game was divided into six quarters of eight minutes each, that meant a fresh pony after every halt. The Skidars' team, even supposing there were no accidents, could only supply one pony for every other change ; and two to one is heavy odds. Again, as Shiraz, the grey Syrian, pointed out, they were meeting the pink and pick of the polo- ponies of Upper India, ponies that had cost from a thousand rupees each, while they themselves were a cheap lot gathered, often from country- carts, by their masters, who belonged to a poor but honest native infantry regiment. " Money means pace and weight," said Shiraz, rubbing his black-silk nose dolefully along his 41 THE MALTESE CAT neat-fitting boot, "and by the maxims of the game as I know it — " " Ah, but we aren't playing the maxims," said The Maltese Cat. " We're playing the game ; and we've the great advantage of knowing the game. Just think a stride, Shiraz ! We've pulled up from bottom to second place in two weeks against all those fellows on the ground here. That's because we play with our heads as well as our feet." " It makes me feel undersized and unhappy all the same," said Kittiwynk, a mouse-coloured mare with a red brow-band and the cleanest pair of legs that ever an aged pony owned. " They've twice our style, these others." Kittiwynk looked at the gathering and sighed. The hard, dusty polo-ground was lined with thou- sands of soldiers, black and white, not counting hundreds and hundreds of carriages and drags and dog-carts, and ladies with brilliant-coloured para- sols, and officers in uniform and out of it, and crowds of natives behind them ; and orderlies on camels, who had halted to watch the game, instead of carrying letters up and down the station ; and native horse-dealers running about on thin-eared Biluchi mares, looking for a chance to sell a few first-class polo-ponies. Then there were the ponies of thirty teams that had entered for the Upper In- dia Free-for-All Cup — nearly every pony of worth 42 THE MALTESE CAT and dignity, from Mhow to Peshawur, from Alla- habad to Multan; prize ponies, Arabs, Syrian, Barb, country-bred, Deccanee, Waziri, and Kabul ponies of every colour and shape and temper that you could imagine. Some of them were in mat- roofed stables, close to the polo-ground, but most were under saddle, while their masters, who had been defeated in the earlier games, trotted in and out and told the world exactly how the game should be played. It was a glorious sight, and the come and go of the little, quick hooves, and the incessant saluta- tions of ponies that had met before on other polo- grounds or race-courses, were enough to drive a four-footed thing wild. But the Skidars' team were careful not to know their neighbours, though half the ponies on the ground were anxious to scrape acquaintance with the little fellows that had come from the North, and, so far, had swept the board. " Let's see," said a soft gold-coloured Arab, who had been playing very badly the day before, to The Maltese Cat; "didn't we meet in Abdul Rahman's stable in Bombay, four seasons ago ? I won the Paikpattan Cup next season, you may remember ? " " Not me," said The Maltese Cat, politely. " I was at Malta then, pulling a vegetable-cart. I don't race. I play the game." 43 THE MALTESE CAT " Oh ! " said the Arab, cocking his tail and swag- gering off. " Keep yourselves to yourselves," said The Mal- tese Cat to his companions. " We don't want to rub noses with all those goose-rumped half-breeds of Upper India. When we've won this Cup they'll give their shoes to know us" " We sha'n't win the Cup," said Shiraz. " How do you feel ? " " Stale as last night's feed when a muskrat has run over it," said Polaris, a rather heavy-shouldered grey; and the rest of the team agreed with him. " The sooner you forget that the better," said The Maltese Cat, cheerfully. " They've finished tiffin in the big tent. We shall be wanted now. If your saddles are not comfy, kick. If your bits aren't easy, rear, and let the saises know whether your boots are tight." Each pony had his sais^ his groom, who lived and ate and slept with the animal, and had betted a good deal more than he could afford on the result of the game. There was no chance of any- thing going wrong, but to make sure, each sais was shampooing the legs of his pony to the last minute. Behind the saises sat as many of the Ski- dars' regiment as had leave to attend the match - about half the native officers, and a hundred or two dark, black-bearded men, with the regimental pipers nervously fingering the big, beribboned 44 THE MALTESE CAT bagpipes. The Skidars were what they call a Pioneer regiment, and the bagpipes made the na- tional music of half their men. The native officers held bundles of polo-sticks, long cane-handled mallets, and as the grand stand filled after lunch they arranged themselves by ones and twos at different points round the ground, so that if a stick were broken the player would not have far to ride for a new one. An impatient British Cavalry Band struck up " If you want to know the time, ask a p'leeceman ! " and the two umpires in light dust- coats danced out on two little excited ponies. The four players of the Archangels' team followed, and the sight of their beautiful mounts made Shiraz groan again. " Wait till we know," said The Maltese Cat. " Two of 'em are playing in blinkers, and that means they can't see to get out of the way of their own side, or they may shy at the umpires' ponies. They've all got white web-reins that are sure to stretch or slip ! " "And," said Kittiwynk, dancing to take the stiffness out of her, " they carry their whips in their hands instead of on their wrists. Hah ! " " True enough. No man can manage his stick and his reins and his whip that way," said The Maltese Cat. " I've fallen over every square yard of the Malta ground, and I ought to know." 45 THE MALTESE CAT He quivered his little, flea-bitten withers just to show how satisfied he felt; but his heart was not so light. Ever since he had drifted into India on a troop-ship, taken, with an old rifle, as part pay- ment for a racing debt, The Maltese Cat had played and preached polo to the Skidars' team on the Skidars' stony polo-ground. Now a polo-pony is like a poet. If he is born with a love for the game, he can be made. The Maltese Cat knew that bamboos grew solely in order that polo-balls might be turned from their roots, that grain was given to ponies to keep them in hard condition, and that ponies were shod to prevent them slipping on a turn. But, besides all these things, he knew every trick and device of the finest game in the world, and for two seasons had been teaching the others all he knew or guessed. " Remember," he said for the hundredth time, as the riders came up, "you must play together, and you must play with your heads. Whatever happens, follow the ball. Who goes out first ? " Kittiwynk, Shiraz, Polaris, and a short high little bay fellow with tremendous hocks and no withers worth speaking of (he was called Corks) were being girthed up, and the soldiers in the background stared with all their eyes. " I want you men to keep quiet," said Lutyens, the captain of the team, "and especially not to blow your pipes." 46 THE MALTESE CAT " Not if we win, Captain Sahib ? " asked the piper. " If we win you can do what you please," said Lutyens, with a smile, as he slipped the loop of his stick over his wrist, and wheeled to canter to his place. The Archangels' ponies were a little bit above themselves on account of the many-col- oured crowd so close to the ground. Their riders were excellent players, but they were a team of crack players instead of a crack team; and that made all the difference in the world. They hon- estly meant to play together, but it is very hard for four men, each the best of the team he is picked from, to remember that in polo no brilliancy in hitting or riding makes up for playing alone. Their captain shouted his orders to them by name, and it is a curious thing that if you call his name aloud in public after an Englishman you make him hot and fretty. Lutyens said nothing to his men, because it had all been said before. He pulled up Shiraz, for he was playing " back," to guard the goal. Powell on Polaris was half-back, and Macnamara and Hughes on Corks and Kitti- wynk were forwards. The tough, bamboo ball was set in the middle of the ground, one hundred and fifty yards from the ends, and Hughes crossed sticks, heads up, with the Captain of the Archan- gels, who saw fit to play forward ; that is a place from which you cannot easily control your team. 47 THE MALTESE CAT The little click as the cane-shafts met was heard all over the ground, and then Hughes made some sort of quick wrist-stroke that just dribbled the ball a few yards. Kittiwynk knew that stroke of old, and followed as a cat follows a mouse. While the Captain of the Archangels was wrenching his pony round, Hughes struck with all his strength, and next instant Kittiwynk was away, Corks fol- lowing close behind her, their little feet pattering like raindrops on glass. " Pull out to the left," said Kittiwynk between her teeth ; " it's coming your way, Corks ! " The back and half-back of the Archangels were tearing down on her just as she was within reach of the ball. Hughes leaned forward with a loose rein, and cut it away to the left almost under Kittiwynk's foot, and it hopped and skipped off to Corks, who saw that if he was not quick it would run beyond the boundaries. That long bouncing drive gave the Archangels time to wheel and send three men across the ground to head off Corks. Kittiwynk stayed where she was; for she knew the game. Corks was on the ball half a fraction of a second before the others came up, and Mac- namara, with a backhanded stroke, sent it back across the ground to Hughes, who saw the way clear to the Archangels' goal, and smacked the ball in before any one quite knew what had hap- pened. 48 THE MALTESE CAT "That's luck," said Corks, as they changed ends. " A goal in three minutes for three hits, and no riding to speak of." "'Don't know," said Polaris. "We've made 'em angry too soon. 'Shouldn't wonder if they tried to rush us off our feet next time." "Keep the ball hanging, then," said Shiraz. " That wears out every pony that is not used to it." Next time there was no easy galloping across the ground. All the Archangels closed up as one man, but there they stayed, for Corks, Kittiwynk, and Polaris were somewhere on the top of the ball, marking time among the rattling sticks, while Shiraz circled about outside, waiting for a chance. " We can do this all day," said Polaris, ramming his quarters into the side of another pony. "Where do you think you're shoving to *? " " I'll — I'll be driven in an ekka if I know," was the gasping reply, " and I'd give a week's feed to get my blinkers off. I can't see anything." " The dust is rather bad. Whew ! That was one for my off-hock. Where's the ball, Corks ? " " Under my tail. At least, the man's looking for it there ! This is beautiful. They can't use their sticks, and it's driving 'em wild. Give old Blinkers a push and then he'll go over." " Here, don't touch me ! I can't see. I'll — I'll back out, I think," said the pony in blinkers, 49 THE MALTESE CAT who knew that if you can't see all round your head, you cannot prop yourself against the shock. Corks was watching the ball where it lay in the dust, close to his near fore-leg, with Macnamara's shortened stick tap-tapping it from time to time. Kittiwynk was edging her way out of the scrim- mage, whisking her stump of a tail with nervous excitement. " Ho ! They've got it," she snorted. " Let me out ! " and she galloped like a rifle-bullet just be- hind a tall lanky pony of the Archangels, whose rider was swinging up his stick for a stroke. "Not to-day, thank you," said Hughes, as the blow slid off his raised stick, and Kittiwynk laid her shoulder to the tall pony's quarters, and shoved him aside just as Lutyens on Shiraz sent the ball where it had come from, and the tall pony went skating and slipping away to the left. Kittiwynk, seeing that Polaris had joined Corks in the chase for the ball up the ground, dropped into Polaris' place, and then " time " was called. The Skidars' ponies wasted no time in kicking or fuming. They knew that each minute's rest meant so much gain, and trotted off to the rails, and their saises began to scrape and blanket and rub them at once. " Whew ! " said Corks, stiffening up to get all the tickle of the big vulcanite scraper. " If we were playing pony for pony, we would bend those 5° THE MALTESE CAT Archangels double in half an hour. But they'll bring up fresh ones and fresh ones and fresh ones after that — you see." " Who cares ? " said Polaris. " We've drawn first blood. Is my hock swelling ? " " 'Looks puffy," said Corks. " You must have had rather a wipe. Don't let it stiffen. You'll be wanted again in half an hour." "What's the game like?" said The Maltese Cat. "'Ground's like your shoe, except where they put too much water on it," said Kittiwynk. " Then it's slippery. Don't play in the centre. There's a bog there. I don't know how their next four are going to behave, but we kept the ball hanging, and made 'em lather for nothing. Who goes out? Two Arabs and a couple of country-breds ! That's bad. What a comfort it is to wash your mouth out ! " Kitty was talking with a neck of a lather-covered soda-water bottle between her teeth, and trying to look over her withers at the same time. This gave her a very coquettish air. " What's bad ? " said Grey Dawn, giving to the girth and admiring his well-set shoulders. "You Arabs can't gallop fast enough to keep yourselves warm — that's what Kitty means," said Polaris, limping to show that his hock needed attention. "Are you playing back, Grey Dawn?" 51 THE MALTESE CAT " 'Looks like it," said Grey Dawn, as Lutyens swung himself up. Powell mounted The Rabbit, a plain bay country-bred much like Corks, but with mulish ears. Macnamara took Faiz-Ullah, a handy, short-backed little red Arab with a long tail, and Hughes mounted Benami, an old and sullen brown beast, who stood over in front more than a polo-pony should. "Benami looks like business," said Shiraz. "How's your temper, Ben*?" The old cam- paigner hobbled off without answering, and The Maltese Cat looked at the new Archangel ponies prancing about on the ground. They were four beautiful blacks, and they saddled big enough and strong enough to eat the Skidars' team and gallop away with the meal inside them. "Blinkers again," said The Maltese Cat. "Good enough!" " They're chargers — cavalry chargers ! " said Kittiwynk, indignantly. " they'll never see thirteen three again." " They've all been fairly measured, and they've all got their certificates," said The Maltese Cat, " or they wouldn't be here. We must take things as they come along, and keep your eyes on the ball." The game began, but this time the Skidars were penned to their own end of the ground, and the watching ponies did not approve of that. 52 THE MALTESE CAT " Faiz-Ullah is shirking — as usual," said Po- laris, with a scornful grunt. " Faiz-Ullah is eating whip," said Corks. They could hear the leather-thonged polo-quirt lacing the little fellow's well-rounded barrel. Then The Rabbit's shrill neigh came across the grouad. " I can't do all the work," he cried desperately. " Play the game — don't talk," The Maltese Cat whickered ; and all the ponies wriggled with ex- citement, and the soldiers and the grooms gripped the railings and shouted. A black pony with blinkers had singled out old Benami, and was in- terfering with him in every possible way. They could see Benami shaking his head up and down, and flapping his under lip. " There'll be a fall in a minute," said Polaris. " Benami is getting stuffy." The game flickered up and down between goal- post and goal-post, and the black ponies were getting more confident as they felt they had the legs of the others. The ball was hit out of a little scrimmage, and Benami and The Rabbit fol- lowed it, Faiz-Ullah only too glad to be quiet for an instant. The blinkered black pony came up like a hawk, with two of his own side behind him, and Benami's eye glittered as he raced. The question was which pony should make way for the other, for each rider was perfectly willing to risk a fall in 53 THE MALTESE CAT a good cause. The black, who had been driven nearly crazy by his blinkers, trusted to his weight and his temper ; but Benami knew how to apply his weight and how to keep his temper. They met, and there was a cloud of dust. The black was lying on his side, all the breath knocked out of his body, The Rabbit was a hundred yards up the ground with the ball, and Benami was sitting down. He had slid nearly ten yards on his tail, but he had had his revenge, and sat cracking his nostrils till the black pony rose. " That's what you get for interfering. Do you want any more *? " said Benami, and he plunged into the game. Nothing was done that quarter, because Faiz-Ullah would not gallop, though Macnamara beat him whenever he could spare a second. The fall of the black pony had im- pressed his companions tremendously, and so the Archangels could not profit by Faiz-Ullah's bad behaviour. But as The Maltese Cat said when " time " was called, and the four came back blowing and drip- ping, Faiz-Ullah ought to have been kicked all round Umballa. If he did not behave better next time The Maltese Cat promised to pull out his Arab tail by the roots and — eat it. There was no time to talk, for the third four were ordered out. The third quarter of a game is generally the 54 THE MALTESE CAT hottest, for each side thinks that the others must be pumped ; and most of the winning play in a game is made about that time. Lutyens took over The Maltese Cat with a pat and a hug, for Lutyens valued him more than anything else in the world ; Powell had Shikast, a little grey rat with no pedigree and no manners outside polo; Macnamara mounted Bamboo, the largest of the team; and Hughes Who's Who, alias The Animal. He was supposed to have Australian blood in his veins, but he looked like a clothes-horse, and you could whack his legs with an iron crowbar without hurting him. They went out to meet the very flower of the Archangels' team; and when Who's Who saw their elegantly booted legs and their beautiful satin skins, he grinned a grin through his light, well-worn bridle. "My word!" said Who's Who. "We must give 'em a little football. These gentlemen need a rubbing down." "No biting," said The Maltese Cat, warningly; for once or twice in his career Who's Who had been known to forget himself in that way. "Who said anything about biting? I'm not playing tiddly-winks. I'm playing the game." The Archangels came down like a wolf on the fold, for they were tired of football, and they wanted polo. They got it more and more. Just 55 THE MALTESE CAT after the game began, Lutyens hit a ball that was coming towards him rapidly, and it rolled in the air, as a ball sometimes will, with the whirl of a frightened partridge. Shikast heard, but could not see it for the minute, though he looked every- where and up into the air as The Maltese Cat had taught him. When he saw it ahead and overhead he went forward with Powell as fast as he could put foot to ground. It was then that Powell, a quiet and level-headed man, as a rule, became in- spired, and played a stroke that sometimes comes off successfully after long practice. He took his stick in both hands, and, standing up in his stir- rups, swiped at the ball in the air, Munipore fashion. There was one second of paralysed as- tonishment, and then all four sides of the ground went up in a yell of applause and delight as the ball flew true (you could see the amazed Arch- angels ducking in their saddles to dodge the line of flight, and looking at it with open mouths), and the regimental pipes of the Skidars squealed from the railings as long as the pipers had breath. Shikast heard the stroke ; but he heard the head of the stick fly off at the same time. Nine hun- dred and ninety-nine ponies out of a thousand would have gone tearing on after the ball with a useless player pulling at their heads; but Powell knew him, and he knew Powell ; and the instant he felt Powell's right leg shift a trifle on the saddle- 56 THE MALTESE CAT flap, he headed to the boundary, where a native officer was frantically waving a new stick. Before the shouts had ended, Powell was armed again. Once before in his life The Maltese Cat had heard that very same stroke played off his own back, and had profited by the confusion it wrought. This time he acted on experience, and leaving Bamboo to guard the goal in case of accidents, came through the others like a flash, head and tail low — Lutyens standing up to ease him — swept on and on before the other side knew what was the matter, and nearly pitched on his head between the Archangels' goal-post as Lutyens kicked the ball in after a straight scurry of a hundred and fifty yards. If there was one thing more than another upon which The Maltese Cat prided himself, it was on this quick, streaking kind of run half across the ground. He did not believe in taking balls round the field unless you were clearly over- matched. After this they gave the Archangels five-minuted football ; and an expensive fast pony hates football because it rumples his temper. Who's Who showed himself even better than Polaris in this game. He did not permit any wriggling away, but bored joyfully into the scrim- mage as if he had his nose in a feed-box and was looking for something nice. Little Shikast jumped on the ball the minute it got clear, and every time an Archangel pony followed it, he 57 THE MALTESE CAT found Shikast standing over it, asking what was the matter. " If we can live through this quarter," said The Maltese Cat, " I sha'n't care. Don't take it out of yourselves. Let them do the lathering." So the ponies, as their riders explained after- wards, "shut-up." The Archangels kept them tied fast in front of their goal, but it cost the Archangels' ponies all that was left of their tem- pers ; and ponies began to kick, and men began to repeat compliments, and they chopped at the legs of Who's Who, and he set his teeth and stayed where he was, and the dust stood up like a tree over the scrimmage until that hot quarter ended. They found the ponies very excited and con- fident when they went to their saises ; and The Maltese Cat had to warn them that the worst of the game was coming. " Now we are all going in for the second time," said he, " and they are trotting out fresh ponies. You think you can gallop, but you'll find you can't; and then you'll be sorry." " But two goals to nothing is a halter-long lead," said Kittiwynk, prancing. " How long does it take to get a goal *? " The Maltese Cat answered. " For pity's sake, don't run away with a notion that the game is half- won just because we happen to be in luck now ! 58 THE MALTESE CAT They'll ride you into the grand stand, if they can; you must not give 'em a chance. Follow the ball." "Football, as usual?" said Polaris. "My hock's half as big as a nose-bag." "Don't let them have a look at the ball, if you can help it. Now leave me alone. I must get all the rest I can before the last quarter." He hung down his head and let all his mus- cles go slack, Shikast, Bamboo, and Who's Who copying his example. " Better not watch the game," he said. " We aren't playing, and we shall only take it out of ourselves if we grow anxious. Look at the ground and pretend it's fly-time." They did their best, but it was hard advice to follow. The hooves were drumming and the sticks were rattling all up and down the ground, and yells of applause from the English troops told that the Archangels were pressing the Skidars hard. The native soldiers behind the ponies groaned and grunted, and said things in under- tones, and presently they heard a long-drawn shout and a clatter of hurrahs ! "One to the Archangels," said Shikast, without raising his head. "Time's nearly up. Oh, my sire — and dam ! " " Faiz-Ullah," said The Maltese Cat, " if you don't play to the last nail in your shoes this time, 59 THE MALTESE CAT I'll kick you on the ground before all the other ponies." " I'll do my best when my time comes," said the little Arab, sturdily. The saises looked at each other gravely as they rubbed their ponies' legs. This was the time when long purses began to tell, and everybody knew it. Kittiwynk and the others came back, the sweat dripping over their hooves and their tails telling sad stories. " They're better than we are," said Shiraz. " I knew how it would be/' " Shut your big head," said The Maltese Cat ; 44 we've one goal to the good yet." " Yes ; but it's two Arabs and two country- breds to play now," said Corks. "Faiz-Ullah, remember ! " He spoke in a biting voice. As Lutyens mounted Grey Dawn he looked at his men, and they did not look pretty. They were covered with dust and sweat in streaks. Their yellow boots were almost black, their wrists were red and lumpy, and their eyes seemed two inches deep in their heads ; but the expression in the eyes was satisfactory. 44 Did you take anything at tiffin?" said Lut- yens; and the team shook their heads. They were too dry to talk. 44 All right. The Archangels did. They are worse pumped than we are." 60 THE MALTESE CAT "They've got the better ponies," said Powell. " I sha'n't be sorry when this business is over." That fifth quarter was a painful one in every way. Faiz-Ullah played like a little red demon, and The Rabbit seemed to be everywhere at once, and Benami rode straight at anything and every- thing that came in his way; while the umpires on their ponies wheeled like gulls outside the shifting game. But the Archangels had the bet- ter mounts, — they had kept their racers till late in the game, — and never allowed the Skidars to play football. They hit the ball up and down the width of the ground till Benami and the rest were outpaced. Then they went forward, and time and again Lutyens and Grey Dawn were just, and only just, able to send the ball away with a long, spitting backhander. Grey Dawn forgot that he was an Arab, and turned from grey to blue as he galloped. Indeed, he forgot too well, for he did not keep his eyes on the ground as an Arab should, but stuck out his nose and scuttled for the dear honour of the game. They had watered the ground once or twice be- tween the quarters, and a careless waterman had emptied the last of his skinful all in one place near the Skidars' goal. It was close to the end of the play, and for the tenth time Grey Dawn was bolting after the ball, when his near hind foot slipped on the greasy mud, and he rolled over and 61 THE MALTESE CAT over, pitching Lutyens just clear of the goal-post; and the triumphant Archangels made their goal. Then "time" was called — two goals all; but Lutyens had to be helped up, and Grey Dawn rose with his near hind leg strained somewhere. " What's the damage ? " said Powell, his arm around Lutyens. "Collar-bone,